Electric sign.



PATENTED APR. 9, '1907.

B. WALL. ELECTRIC SIGN.

APPLICATION FILED DBO. 2a, 1906.

lll nl S LL S S CL N H W YHE NcRRls PETERS co, wAsmNc and carry glow-l amps upon their' faces.

UNITED STATES PATENT OEIEIEE.

POLITAN ENGINEERING COMPANY, ORGANIZED IN NEW YORK.

ELECTRIC SIGN.

Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented April 9, 1907.

Application iiled December 28, 1906. Serial No. 349,888.

To CLN, 'Lv/110111, t '11i/ty coll/cern:

Be it known that I, BENJAMIN VALL, a citizen of the United States, residing at Allendale, in the county of Bergen and State of New Jersey, have invented a certain new and useful Improvement in Electric Signs, of which the following is a speciIication.

My invention relates to electric signs in which characters or letters are raised above the general surface of the supporting-plate In signs of this class as hitherto constructed the raised letters or characters are permanently secured upon the supporting-plate, the circuit-wires being connected to the lamp-sockets from the back of said plate. An objection to this construction is that if rthe sign-plate is secured, as is often the case,

against the wall it is necessary to take down the whole sign in order to repair an injury to the circuit connections of the lamps of any one character. As it very often happens that it is desirable permanently to secure the signboard in place, such a necessity as this is troublesome and in the case of large signs involves considerable labor and expense.

My invention consists in making the letters or characters which carry the glowlamps in open-box or trough shape and in providing means for securing each letter or character detachably upon the sign-plate, so that, Yfor example, in case of injury tothe eircuit connections o't' a lamp belonging to any given letter that letter individually may be removed at will from the sign-plate suliciently to enable said circuit connections to be .reached and repaired, a'liter which the letter may be again put in place and secured.

In the accompanying drawings, Figure l is a front view of a sign-plate, showing the letter or character in place thereon. Fig. 2 is a similar view with the letter removed. F ig. 3 is a rear view of the removed letter, showing the circuit connections. Fig. 4 is an enlargedcross-section of the letter and signplate on the line :c a of Fig. l. Fig. 5 is an end view of the letter in place on the signplate.

Similar numbers of reference indicate like parts.

l is the sign-plate, preferably el" sheet 'metal 2 is the letter or character, (here the letter L, which is made also of sheet metal and in box or trough form, with its rear side open.

The face-wall 3 ot the letter is provided with openings to receive the sockets 4 et the glow-lamps 5, which sockets are secured in said openings in any suitable way. rlhe particular mode ot securing indicated in the drawings is a known construction in common use, in which the sockets are provided with an outer llange G and partial inner I langes 7, which inner flanges being introduced through suitably-liormed extensions of the opening the socket is turned so that the face-wall 3 of the letter is received between said langes, and the socket is thus securely held. The lamps 5 are inserted in the sockets t in the usual way.

Inside the letter the sockets of the lamps 5 are connected to the parallel circuit-wires S, and said wires 8 are connected to the supplymains by the wires S), which pass through suitable guides l() on the sign-plate.

In order to secure each letter upon the sign-plate, I attach to said sign-plate by soldering or by any other suitable means parallel strips I l. and 12, which extend outwardly from said sign-plate. The strips conform to the general shape oi" the letter and they are to be so disposed as to receive the side walls 13 of the letter between them, as shown in Fig. 4, with a substantially close ht. Upon the outer surface of the outer strips 12 I provide eyes or loops lli, also olf sheet metal, and upon the outer surjlacc of the side walls of the letter I provide similar eyes l5. Then the letter is in place between its strips, each eye 15 on the letter comes .into proximity to an eye 14 on the strip, so that a staple-shaped key IG maybe inserted in both eyes, thus securing the letter to its holding-strips. In order to remove the letter from its strips, it is merely necessary to withdraw the key 16, when the letter can. be raised out olt its strips and the circuit connections exposed. Sullicient lengths o'lE the connecting-wires 9 are left to permit this removal of the letter, as shown at 17, Fig. el..

Vith regard to the length and arrangement ol the holding-strips Il and 12 it is oi course necessary, as stated, that they should generally conform to the shape oi" the letter in order to receive the side walls 5 but it is not necessary that they should form a complete IOO outline of the letter, although, if desired, they may do so. All that is essential is that they should be suflicient in extent and arrangement to retain the letter in proper position on the sign-plate. Vhere a letter has curved portions, for example, in addition to straight portions, it may be quite suiiicient to extend the strips to receive the straight edges and omit them where the curved edges would come. This is illustrated in Figs. l and 2, where on the left-hand side of the letter L the strip 12 terminates before the curves at 18 and 19 are reached. ln letters or characters involving many curves or of complicated shape it will readily be understood that the strips will be arranged in the way best adapted to retain the letter, the maker using his own judgment in leaving gaps between them, but of course always providing enough of said strips to hold the letter properly in position. The openings 20, Fig. 5, in the side wall of the letter serve for purposes of ventilation.

I claiml. In an electric sign, a supporting-plate, an open-boX-shaped character, glow-lamp sockets secured in the face-wall of' said character and received in the space surrounded by the side walls thereof, and means for detachably securing said character upon said plate and with the edges of its open side bearing against the surface of said plate.

2. ln an electric sign, a supporting-plate, a plurality of pairs of parallel strips thereon, an open-boX-shaped character havingits side walls constructed to be received between said strips, means for detachably securing said side walls to said strips, and means for securing glow-lamps to the face-wall of said character.

3. ln an electric sign, a supporting-plate, a plurality of pairs of parallel strips thereon, an open-boX-shaped character having its side walls constructed to be received between said strips, eyes on said strips, eyes on said side walls, keys constructed to enter said eyes to detachably secure said side walls to said strips and means for securing glow-lamps to the face-wall of said character.

In testimony whereof lhave affixed my siglVitnesses:

. VALTER N EUMULLEN,

J. S. BURHAUs, Jr. 

